Five days before an always-intense match against Real Madrid, Barcelona can take a big step toward the knockout round of the Champions League when it visits Benfica today.
Barcelona matched its best Spanish league start with a comeback 3-2 win at Sevilla on Saturday, and coach Tito Vilanova wants his team to focus on the Portuguese club and not be distracted by Madrid’s visit to the Camp Nou on Sunday.
“The game in the Champions League will be more complicated than the game against Madrid,” Vilanova said.
“This game is not a moment to hold something back. We have to go to Lisbon looking to win. Benfica is an important team. (Last season) they deserved to move past Chelsea, which then went on to win the tournament.”
Also, Spartak Moscow hosts Celtic looking for its first victory in the other Group G match.
Four-time champion Barcelona leads the group with three points. Celtic and Benfica are second with one point each after drawing in their opener.
Lionel Messi has scored 10 goals in nine games for Barcelona this season. His team needed Messi’s late goals to beat Spartak at home in their first match. Since then, the Argentina forward has gone two outings without finding the back of the net.
Last weekend, Sevilla’s defense was successful at stopping Messi from scoring, so he turned playmaker to assist Cesc Fabregas and David Villa for two goals in the last four minutes to secure Barcelona’s sixth win in as many league games.
“It is increasingly difficult. We want to attack but teams play farther and farther back in their area,” Messi told Spanish newspaper El Pais.
“Our opponents know us well and look for our weak points, and if they are lucky and score off a counterattack they can make things difficult for us.”
Barcelona will be bolstered by the return of Andres Iniesta, Carles Puyol and Adriano from injury, while midfielder Thiago Alcantara will be sidelined for two months after hurting a ligament in his right knee in Seville.
Benfica may be the leader of the Portuguese league, but it is winless in its last 12 games against Spanish competition.
“We know we’re going to have to run a lot,” Benfica coach Jorge Jesus said after his team’s 2-1 win over Pacos Ferreira on Friday.
“Barcelona will wear us down. It’s going to be a very intense game.”
Lima, an offseason transfer from Braga, scored both Benfica’s goals Friday, taking his tally to three goals in as many league matches.
Benfica will be without first-choice center forward Oscar Cardozo because of injury, while its midfield has been weakened by the recent transfers of Javi Garcia to Manchester City and Axel Witsel to Zenit St. Petersburg.
With Barcelona favored to win at Benfica and eventually take first place in the group, Spartak has a good opportunity to move into position to fight for second against Celtic.
The Scottish champions have lost 19 of their 20 away games all time in the Champions League, with a sole 1-1 draw at Barcelona in 2004.
“In the last few games, we have done well away from home,” Celtic defender Charlie Mulgrew said in reference to qualifying wins in Helsinki and Helsingborgs.
“We have picked up results and scored goals. So we will be confident we can get points away from home. We have nothing to fear.”
Spartak Moscow rallied to beat Amkar in the Russian League 3-1 Saturday and is tied for fourth place in the standings.
Spartak midfielder Aiden McGeady will face his former team. He made 251 appearances for Celtic from 2004-10.
Spartak coach Unai Emery will be missing goalkeeper Andrey Dikan (right shoulder), midfielder Jose Jurado (leg muscle), and Romulo (knee ligament tear). In the opening game, Romulo scored against Barcelona before Messi took over.
Meanwhile, Juventus is unbeaten this season and in fine form heading into its first Champions League home match in three years, taking on a Shakhtar Donetsk team that is perfect this campaign with 13 wins from 13 matches.
Something will have to give in today night’s Group E match at the year-old Juventus Stadium.
Juventus rolled to a 4-1 win over Roma this weekend, extending its league unbeaten run to 45 matches to be equal with Napoli for the Serie A lead.
Shakhtar has won all 10 of its Ukrainian Premier League games, plus the Ukrainian Super Cup - and knocked Dynamo Kiev out of the Ukrainian Cup.
The club also defeated FC Nordsjaelland 2-0 in its Champions League opener.
In its first match, two-time winner Juventus came back from two goals down to draw 2-2 at defending champion Chelsea, which visits Danish club FC Nordsjaelland in the other group match tonight.
Chelsea is looking to become the first team to retain the Champions League trophy, and wants to improve on its group stage record from last season, when it failed to win any away games.
Chelsea is unbeaten after six Premier League games to top the standings with 16 from 18 points.
Juventus went unbeatean to win Serie A last season when it wasn’t playing in Europe.
Facing a much tougher schedule this campaign, Juve looked tired in a 0-0 draw at Fiorentina on Tuesday but then bounced back to trounce Roma and old nemesis Zdenek Zeman.